Black titania by sonochemistry: A critical evaluation of existing methods.

In the field of photocatalysis, the fabrication of black titania is a booming topic, as it offers a system with improved solar light harvesting properties and increased overall efficiency. The darkening of white TiO powders can be ascribed to surface hydroxylation, oxygen vacancies, Ti centres, or a combination thereof. A handful of studies suggests these defects can be conveniently introduced by acoustic cavitation, generated during sonochemical treatment of pristine TiO powders.

An Atomically Dispersed Mn-Photocatalyst for Generating Hydrogen Peroxide from Seawater via the Water Oxidation Reaction (WOR).

In this work, we have fabricated an aryl amino-substituted graphitic carbon nitride (g-CN) catalyst with atomically dispersed Mn capable of generating hydrogen peroxide (HO) directly from seawater. This new catalyst exhibited excellent reactivity, obtaining up to 2230 μM HO in 7 h from alkaline water and up to 1800 μM from seawater under identical conditions. More importantly, the catalyst was quickly recovered for subsequent reuse without appreciable loss in performance.

The effect of pH and nitrite on the haem pocket of GLB-33, a globin-coupled neuronal transmembrane receptor of Caenorhabditis elegans.

Out of the 34 globins in Caenorhabditis elegans, GLB-33 is a putative globin-coupled transmembrane receptor with a yet unknown function. The globin domain (GD) contains a particularly hydrophobic haem pocket, that rapidly oxidizes to a low-spin hydroxide-ligated haem state at physiological pH. Moreover, the GD has one of the fastest nitrite reductase activity ever reported for globins.

Self-Induced and Progressive Photo-Oxidation of Organophosphonic Acid Grafted Titanium Dioxide.

While synthesis-properties-performance correlations are being studied for organophosphonic acid grafted TiO , their stability and the impact of the exposure conditions on possible changes in the interfacial surface chemistry remain unexplored. Here, the impact of different ageing conditions on the evolution of the surface properties of propyl- and 3-aminopropylphosphonic acid grafted mesoporous TiO over a period of 2 years is reported, using solid-state P and C NMR, ToF-SIMS and EPR as main techniques. In humid conditions under ambient light exposure, PA grafted TiO surfaces initiate and facilitate photo-induced oxidative reactions, resulting in the formation of phosphate species and degradation of the grafted organic group with a loss of carbon content ranging from 40 to 60 wt %.

Compound I Formation and Reactivity in Dimeric Chlorite Dismutase: Impact of pH and the Dynamics of the Catalytic Arginine.

The heme enzyme chlorite dismutase (Cld) catalyzes the degradation of chlorite to chloride and dioxygen. Many questions about the molecular reaction mechanism of this iron protein have remained unanswered, including the electronic nature of the catalytically relevant oxoiron(IV) intermediate and its interaction with the distal, flexible, and catalytically active arginine. Here, we have investigated the dimeric Cld from sp.